News

When the going gets tough, it’s going to be tempting to cut a few corners.

Costs are going up, the bills keep coming through the door, the taxman is chasing his share and all your staff want a pay rise…what are you going to do?

Well, why not cheat? We have had reports that increasingly within our industry, some companies will simply not bother to do all the things that they’ve said they will do.

Defra has released a new invasive species strategy for Great Britain, highlighting a vision protect biodiversity, ecosystems, people and the economy and implement a partnership of government, voluntary organisations, NGOs, academia, businesses and the public.

The report highlights the likelihood that climate change will increase the problems caused by invasive species and sets out its aim to minimise the risk of introduction and establishment and reduce the negative impacts of invasive non-native species…..

We may have said it before but sometimes we in the INNSA offices wonder whether we would have been better focusing on a career in the legal profession.

Such thoughts have arisen a number of times over the past couple of months as we have watched several judgements come in from the civil courts and the Court of Appeal for cases involving Japanese knotweed. The cases have variously resulted in: significant financial damages awarded for misrepresentation … relatively inconsequential damages for loss of property value … and a case where damages were not awarded as the case was found in favour of the defendant.

As we start a new year, I thought it might be worth re-visiting why the Invasive Non Native Specialists Association (INNSA) was originally founded.

Going back twenty years or so, invasive species had become an area for concern and Japanese knotweed in particular had captured the public imagination. Newspaper articles about devalued properties and damage caused by this aggressive invader were appearing regularly and demonised the plant to the point of creating dread amongst homeowners and housebuilders alike.

My personal involvement with Japanese knotweed began in the 1990’s, when I owned and managed both a landscape architectural practice and a landscape design and build company. When Japanese knotweed was found on projects I was working on, I was asked to come up with remediation strategies. The skill sets and teams from my landscaping companies were ideal for comprehensive survey work and the follow-up chemical or physical removal treatment prescribed.

If you only read one line of this article, let it be this one: if you’re selling a home, consider long and hard before you answer “No”, to the question: “is the property affected by Japanese knotweed?” on the TA6 form – you may be much better off if you tick the “Not known” box… maybe even £200,000 better off!

The longer answer is, that if you do want to answer “no” on the form, INNSA would strongly recommended that you have this backed up by a competent professional opinion (ideally a site survey by a competent surveyor, provided by a member of a recognised trade association).